Signaling and Discrimination in Collaborative Projects

Paula Onuchic and Debraj Ray

No 28939, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We study collaborative work in pairs when potential collaborators are motivated by the reputational implications of (joint or solo) projects. In equilibrium, individual collaboration strategies both influence and are influenced by the public assignment of credit for joint work across the two partners. We investigate the fragility of collaboration to small biases in the public’s credit assignment. When collaborators are symmetric, symmetric equilibria are often fragile, and in non-fragile equilibria individuals receive asymmetric collaborative credit based on payoff-irrelevant “identities.” We study payoff distributions across identities within asymmetric equilibria, and compare aggregate welfare across symmetric and asymmetric equilibria.

JEL-codes: D70 D82 J71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lma, nep-mic and nep-ppm
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Published as Paula Onuchic & Debraj Ray, 2023. "Signaling and Discrimination in Collaborative Projects," American Economic Review, vol 113(1), pages 210-252.

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Related works:
Journal Article: Signaling and Discrimination in Collaborative Projects (2023)
Working Paper: Signaling and discrimination in collaborative projects (2023)
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